Sanctum (CLOUD) What is it? Reshaping the future of Solana liquid staking

Project Positioning and Core Vision

Built on Solana’s high-speed, low-cost blockchain architecture, a foundational infrastructure protocol focused on solving core liquidity challenges is emerging. This is Sanctum, an innovative protocol aimed at revolutionizing the trading and application of liquid staking tokens within the Solana ecosystem. Its mission is clear and far-reaching: to build a unified liquidity layer for liquid staking tokens, driving Solana toward a future with “infinite LSTs.”

Unlike traditional single staking protocols, Sanctum’s vision is broader. It keenly perceives the liquidity fragmentation among major liquid staking tokens (such as jitoSOL, mSOL, etc.) within the Solana ecosystem. Through its core modules—Reserve, Router, and Infinity Pool—Sanctum is dedicated to enabling all LSTs to achieve rapid, low-loss exchanges and redemptions.

By the end of 2025, the protocol’s total value locked (TVL) has exceeded $1 billion, ranking among the top DeFi protocols in the Solana ecosystem, validating the market demand and the effectiveness of its solutions.

Dual-Token Economic Model: The Synergy of INF and CLOUD

The brilliance of Sanctum lies in its dual-token system, comprising $INF and $CLOUD, each serving different ecosystem functions and collaboratively building the protocol’s value network.

$INF is the vehicle for liquidity and yield. Users can deposit any whitelisted LST into the Infinity Pool—a liquidity pool supporting multiple LSTs—and receive $INF tokens as proof of deposit. Holding $INF not only signifies ongoing staking rewards but also allows sharing of trading fees within the pool and direct reinvestment into other DeFi protocols, enabling efficient circulation of staked assets.

$CLOUD is also the core of governance and rights within the ecosystem. As the governance token of Sanctum, $CLOUD controls the protocol’s development direction and resource allocation. One of its key utilities is managing the Sanctum Validator Partnership Program, where partners must stake $CLOUD to qualify, and $CLOUD holders vote to decide which partners are integrated into the ecosystem.

In terms of distribution, $CLOUD has a total supply of 1 billion tokens, with an initial circulating supply of 18%, ensuring the community maintains a dominant position at project launch.

Protocol Operation Mechanisms and Technological Innovations

Sanctum’s technical architecture is fully built on the Solana blockchain, leveraging its high throughput and low transaction costs to enable decentralized and efficient LST trading. Its core innovation is creating a zero-slippage LST trading market. In traditional decentralized exchanges, large trades often suffer from price slippage due to insufficient liquidity depth, leading to losses.

Sanctum’s Infinity Pool aggregates liquidity from all major LSTs, allowing users to seamlessly and low-lossly swap between any two LSTs, effectively solving the liquidity fragmentation problem in the LST market. Besides trading, the Reserve module provides instant unstaking services, breaking the traditional waiting period of several epochs for redemption, greatly enhancing capital flexibility.

In terms of security, Sanctum inherits Solana’s mature security framework. All transactions are verified via cryptographic signatures and permanently recorded on-chain, ensuring transaction integrity and transparency.

Recent Market Performance and Data Analysis

According to the latest data from Gate platform, as of January 14, 2026, Sanctum’s governance token $CLOUD exhibits significant price volatility, which is common among emerging DeFi protocol tokens.

$CLOUD ’s all-time high reached $0.6297, with a low of $0.06364, showing a wide price range. Currently, $CLOUD is trading at $0.07055, with a market cap of approximately $12.72 million and a fully diluted valuation (FDV) of about $70.68 million.

Regarding supply and distribution, the circulating supply of $CLOUD is 180 million tokens, representing 18% of the total supply of 1 billion tokens, indicating substantial remaining issuance potential. Future release pace may impact market prices. Market sentiment is neutral, with limited trading activity—24-hour trading volume is about $23,590.

Sanctum plays a “liquidity hub” role within the Solana DeFi ecosystem, connecting validators and stakers providing network security on one end, and capital-efficient DeFi users and traders on the other. Through its core Infinity Pool and zero-slippage trading market, Sanctum links isolated LST assets into a highly liquid whole.

Ecosystem Expansion and Future Roadmap

Sanctum’s ambitions extend beyond a mere trading tool. The protocol is expanding its influence into broader financial and everyday scenarios through strategic partnerships and product innovations.

In DeFi, Sanctum has integrated deeply with major platforms like Kamino, Drift, Orca, enabling $CLOUD and various LSTs to participate in complex yield farming and leverage strategies.

A forward-looking plan is Sanctum Pay. The project is collaborating with BasedApp to develop the first debit card supported by LST yields. Users may soon be able to use the income generated from staking SOL for daily expenses without selling their crypto assets, representing a key step in bridging the crypto and traditional consumption worlds.

Additionally, the protocol plans to launch Sanctum Launchpad, supporting new project launches within the ecosystem using LST assets—for example, the Pathfinders team is exploring using pathSOL yields to fund free NFT minting events.

Project Challenges and Risk Considerations

Despite promising prospects, Sanctum faces multiple challenges.

First, market competition is intensifying. As a high-performance blockchain, Solana’s DeFi ecosystem is innovating rapidly, with many protocols focusing on liquidity aggregation and staking services. Sanctum must maintain its technological edge and ecosystem appeal.

Second, the protocol’s performance is closely tied to the Solana network and the depth of the LST market. Any factors affecting confidence in Solana or causing a contraction in the staking market could impact Sanctum’s foundational business.

Third, token price volatility is a double-edged sword. While it may attract high-yield traders, it also amplifies asset risks for ordinary participants. Data as of December 21, 2025, shows $CLOUD ’s price experienced significant retracement over the past year.

Finally, as a smart contract-based DeFi protocol, it always faces potential code vulnerabilities. Although the team has conducted audits, absolute security remains an ongoing pursuit in decentralized finance.

Sanctum’s innovative dual-token model and zero-slippage trading market precisely address the liquidity shortage of LSTs in the Solana ecosystem. With over $1 billion in TVL and extensive DeFi integrations, its solutions have gained initial market validation. Future development will depend on ecosystem expansion success, competitive resilience, and the long-term growth of the Solana staking market.